Two White Plains auto body shops are fighting for control of a garage, each claiming that the other is interfering with business and costing them customers, while both are facing eviction.
Mitchell Automotive Inc., run by Anthony Masella, sued City Cars Metropolitan Ltd., run by Vinny Macchia, last month in Westchester Supreme Court, accusing City Cars of blocking access to the property.
It is Masella and Mitchell Automotive who are obstructing business, Macchia said in an interview, and using more parking spaces than bargained for.
“It”™s a crazy situation,” said the landlord, Peter Plati Jr. of Ossining. “Everything”™s on hold. I can”™t rent to who I want to rent to.”
Plati owns the property at 25 Irving Place, near Kittrel Park, in an industrial area at the edge of downtown White Plains.
City Cars signed a five-year lease in 2013 with Plati”™s 25 Irving Place LLC. The deal included an option to buy the property within five years, for $950,000 and the right of first refusal if another buyer was found, according to a lawsuit that City Cars filed in 2018 against 25 Irving Place.
Macchia claimed that he tried to buy the property in 2017, but a deal was never reached. Then in 2018, Plati tried to evict him.
White Plains City Court approved the eviction order but City Cars has appealed the decision.
Mitchell Automotive arrived on the scene in 2018, after it was displaced from its base at 9 Mitchell Place, near Mamaroneck Avenue, when a developer took over the site for two 28-story apartment towers.
City Cars agreed to sublease 40% of its space to Mitchell Automotive.
“I said no, no, no,” Plati said. “You didn”™t get my permission.”
Last year, Plati leased the entire premises to Mitchell Automotive for five years, beginning at $10,000 a month.
Then City Cars tried to evict Mitchell Automotive. That case is pending.
Mitchell Automotive claims in its lawsuit that City Cars is in effect evicting him by blocking access to the property.
It is entitled to park 10 cars on the site, according to the lawsuit, but City Cars allows only two or three cars and blocks the garage. As a result, customers are discouraged from doing business with him.
Macchia said in an interview that Mitchell Automotive is entitled to park only three customer cars outside and use two bays in the garage. He said Mitchell”™s mechanics use City Cars”™ tools and has illegally installed a sign on the building.
“This is my house,” he said. “It”™s like a robber comes into your house and says, ”˜I want this and I want that, and oh by the way I want your wife.”™”
“Whatever”™s happening between the two of them, let it happen,” Plati, the landlord said. “I”™m not getting involved at this point because we”™re in court and there”™s nothing I can do about it.”
